vox clamante in deserto

Second night of a two-night stay, third floor of a Super 8 motel in Fruita, Colorado, part of a vanishing to Monticello, Utah for three nights over X Mass. View of empty lot + I-70 in the distance. That space somehow pleasant—space carved in my life right now—Bookcliff mountains across valley w/snow. My apartment back in Rangley looks out on campus + admin building, though arroyos and mesas to the west sunsets. Night loops thru La Mesa rich neighborhood, since actually on a mesa mostly away from lights. Star River every night + White River valley, even blue lights of Chevron oil fields beautiful, as LA + Phoenix look beautiful at night from far away—Walk down to the bridge fifty yards away, alone the dark Colorado murmurs, chunks of Rockies ice floating clinking.

I vanish around this time of year, vanish whenever I can, maybe forever some time, but fake happiness and long nights and awful X Mass music give me a headache and make me feel sane which in a world of insanity is a terrible thing, accelerated now these years of fear and anger—I used to feel sorry for my nieces that they’d grow up in the fall of Merican Empire but no, it’s here now and voting isn't going to solve anything. My most radical act being to walk alone in the desert—I only get lonely around people when I feel like a ghost. Not lonely alone in this motel room playing jazz—thuds of car doors slamming in the parking lot and freeway hum, reading “The Book of Jonah” in the room’s Gideons Bible soaking in a hot bath. Forgot Jonah was running from his responsibility, as a prophet, not wanting to tell a whole city that God would destroy them, wanting the sailors to throw him overboard so he would die because he wouldn’t take the responsibility to kill himself. Angry that he’s saved, angry that he gave in, angry at the city angry at the people angry at God who decides to spare the people because they all wear sackcloth, angry at his whole stupid useless life with no freedom, angry at God for saving the people because they’re stupid which says so much about christianity—judaism islam too—as if the story of Abraham wasn’t already insane but I love that Jonah remains defiant to the end.

I could live in hotels if someone paid me—a magazine or website with a credit card and vehicle. I could send dispatches from the road or Notes of a Traveling Dirty Old Man. I could be in Florida kayaking w/the manatees researching if Florida Man phenomena are real, looking for evidence of the Swamp Ape, predicting just how long Miami will stay above water. Instead I’m driving to Monticello Utah to vanish to explore Canyonlands—Abbey country—though may end up snowed in on Friday X Mass Eve which would only give me the excuse to take baths and read since for a five-night trip I have five books, six since I bought another today in Junction—anthology of the best science fiction of the year—along w/Zizek, Graeber and Wheelock’s Latin. The Western Lands by William S. Burroughs—25 years ago, my first trip out west with Todd and Dave, all three college grads changing our lives, them heading to LA and Hollywood to act and write, dropping me off in Phoenix to work for the Forest Service, listening to recordings of Burroughs the whole way, talking like him in a pissed-off southern drawl. A blueberry bagel which looked like a pussy became a Naked Lunch talking monster—The Blueberry Vagina—‘rub some powder on my lips, Bill’—the thing we remember now our lives have changed many times: we’re teachers.

The trip is whatever happens on the trip—fractured ankle in Rattlesnake Canyon became the trip once. The poem is whatever happens in the writing of the poem—essay short story song symphony bass solo. Following el río Colorado downriver thru red sandstone. I live now in el Cañon del Río Blanco close to where it and el Yampa conflow into el río Verde which will conflow soon into el Colorado which I hope to see mañana if not rained or snowed out which has started. Monticello my point of vanishing—cold grey and windy La Sals shrouded, low black swirling stratus-mammatus layer flowing out of the southwest over the Abajos—bare trees and bare worn buildings and worn people just like Rangely tho slightly bigger—two pizza places three other restaurants closed for the season or permanently unclear, including the cool sandwich shop for sale. The crossroads to Blanding and The Grand Canyon or Cortez and Durango. Bears Ears and Grand Gulch. Dark Canyon which I hiked only last spring—feels like years ago now here taking a hot bath. Maybe six groups of visitors here at the hotel but the owner seems to have stacked us all together separated by thin walls of annoyance—revenge for all the racism she’s had to endure. So much for requesting the quietest room. Time to put on some whiskey blues and sit and scribble.

Acres of sage and juniper here with redrock cathedrals—drive down to Needles Overlook on the tip of a mesa: hundreds of miles of Indian Creek Colorado canyons. If I just sit in this chair for the next two days I will be content, with cars and semis rolling by in rain—we are in the clouds—gone downstream but gained altitude. Conceivably I could get in a kayak and paddle to Mejico where the mighty Colorado now dries up before the Gulf. Don’t put it past me to end up living there somehow, retiring finding a señorita with a heart of gold and nice hips—we could joke about being exotic Others to each other—I don't even like whiskey but I wish I did right now so I could sip it into quiet oblivion in this chair watching the car lights in the fog too drunk to eat pizza. Guy at the gas station earlier buying a case of Busch I’m fairly certain he’s going to drink most of tonight. Maybe I’m wrong. It’s happened before. Maybe it’s what I want but I don't like beer either—gin tonics but too cold—don't even usually drink—just socially which is never: Hemingway: ‘I drink to make other people more interesting.’ But don’t have any friends anymore. Not true—a few scattered across the globe: Reagan in Brussels. Melissa in Waikiki tho she’s an ex I still want to fuck. Karen another ex had a huge brain tumor stroke years ago, can’t walk anymore and lives near a sister in Michigan, so sweet baby Jesus I don’t have cause for these blues.

Maybe not the only one vanishing this week—motel filling up—what will we do in the rain? Since moving to Rangely I don’t drive at night—Bermuda Triangle of deer-hitting incidents. Where are the semis going in the wet dark. I used to be able to drive 12-14 hours in a day, trips from LA to Chicago to Cedar City to Phoenix Payson Flagstaff Santa Fe Jackson. Salem Portland Bend Prineville Missoula Fort Collins crossing Continental Divide and Mississippi twice/year—Greyhound bus and Amtrak too—it was possible to go, so I went, and kept on going—even now in Rangely with another fulltime teaching gig it just feels seasonal: every day weighing pros and cons and options to be poor. All the cons probably true for any teaching job—dishonest and incompetent admins and problem students and I write less now that I teach writing—not even a question of time so much as inspiration. I wonder if I should go back to being a fire lookout, poor but happy or at least content. I don't know—which means I have possibilities, so that the next day today when I wake up to snow and high winds I know I’m not going anywhere: brief trip into town to buy water for two days—because now in Merican Empire we must buy water—but with the miracle of the thai restaurant open: drunken noodles for lunch in a small Utah town in the snow.

X Mass Eve, the other good restaurant closed, return to the thai place now somewhat busy: locals, some travelers like the family next to me debating whether to keep going or stay the night—they’d be driving north into the snowstorm which may or may not be done for the night. Temps dropping in the dark the roads freezing. Truckers hunkered in for the night at a gas station engines running all night. Thankfully the last night of bad X Mass music (redundant). The only good X Mass song is Joni Mitchell’s “The River” because  I too wish I had a river to skate away on, though like I said I’d prefer to be kayaking with manatees. Two naps today, two baths, 1/2 hour of yoga so as to not feel a total slug. Somehow a whole day passed in which I didn’t do much which is wonderful and rare. Gave up on Burroughs—too weird even for me I guess. Zizek’s Living In The End Times, understanding 2/3s. Ideology and violence against the state as self defense. Reviewing latest Pushcart for class next semester, sorting stories and poems into units including sci-fi, so I slipped from my vanishing to think about work. Tomorrow clear enough for a hike in Canyonlands though icy in the morning then possibly muddy, to see the confluence of the Green and Colorado. Thai iced tea I drank was so good I am content.

What is ideology but X Mass or an example of it—an unwritten rule of society that everyone must celebrate. That everyone must gather with relatives they don't like. That everyone must endure high levels of stress faking happy. That thneeds must be bought especially for children. That parents must be shamed by the gifts of grandparents. That grandparents must show more affection for grandchildren than they ever did for their children. That parades must be watched or attended and gushed over. That football games must be played and cheered from home. That people must travel across the country in crowded airplanes. That flights must be cancelled and airports shut down by snow. That convos about politics or religion are to be avoided. That the government cannot be criticized in general. That only two political parties are allowed who take the same oligarch money. That poor people must suffer while the rich celebrate. That people must be scared from reading the news. But once you drop out and vanish even for a while all that drops away becomes easy to avoid. Yes we’re privileged to be able to afford motels while women of color who clean rooms still have to work but they too have vanished out of Merican Empire ideology or never were in it so have a certain invisibility. Or so I tell myself to make myself feel better. When I lose this teaching gig maybe I can at least still live a life of invisibility. Invisible in Rangely anyways except in my classes and five years from now students wont even remember me.

Small towns like Monticello and Rangely allow vanishing—the end times happening more on liberal coasts, or Boulder and Denver, cities of virtue signalers. I could have gone east for this trip over the Rockies, maybe arranged for some kinky hookups in Colorado Springs, or ended up in an expensive motel still alone without even great thai restaurants tho surely there are. But didn’t really think about it, wanted to be alone, or alone in a different way than in Rangely, to wake up lazily and wait for ice to melt, call that friend back in Michigan who still laughs, then drive north to Canyonlands Needles District—few cars no one working in the winter except one LEO. Few scattered vanishers RVing in the campground. Petroglyph wall of Newspaper Rock wild weird. Some must be modern like the wagon wheel and horse, but others of large two-legged insect people with antennae or frog heads and feet everywhere. Getting to the trailhead at 12:30 (early lunch of pad thai) so maybe pushing it for a ten-mile round-trip hike. Another guy w/Colorado plates gets out of his truck could almost be me—dressed same same age maybe skinnier. Like men, we do not say hello. Five miles out to the Confluence holy spot written about by Abbey. Though always thoughts of people who lived here long ago (dates getting pushed back more and more per The Dawn of Everything by Davids Graeber and Wengrow.)

Up down small canyon red hoodoos, through hole in a rock wall I call The Portal—leaving one world for another with red mesas in distance. Up metal ladder but otherwise in wilderness, manmade concept (ideology?) which I value. My theme in Rangely: vox clamante in deserto, which I came across randomly in the bath in Isaiah. Junipers piñon pines shrubs on top of mesas, mormon tea, brittle bush? Weaving along smooth red sandstone mounds. All this used to be sand under a huge inland sea back when humans tamed and rode dinosaurs. Five miles on the map must have been flying crows—slogging through sand through huge sandstone mushrooms, sky mostly blues w/some high cirrus and a light breeze. Glimpses of La Sals back by the Moabites, enveloped in one big UFO-hiding cumulus. Jagged rows of huge red hoodoos—the Needles way to the north dividing line of the Park districts. Cairns everywhere and useful when the trail goes slickrock—would not want to take a wrong turn in a side canyon especially if dark on the way back. All lead eventually to Indian Creek supposedly perennial. I like the metaphor of the cairn—poems are cairns—watching sun get lower to horizon passing single vanishers coming back—a woman, a guy, my Colorado doppelgänger—I must be close—we actually talk—I joke that that was a long five miles. He nods—Yeah I think they guesstimated on this one.

Ascending low rock mound and lo! Confluence! I’ve seen both rivers before other places but this—both coming out of separate canyons, waters not mixing yet, green ribbon on the left, murky brown on right. Since I live between these rivers I could float here. Abbey stood here. Is that why this feels holy? The rivers don't even look like they’re moving, The Colorado looks like a mud bank. But I’ve felt it, been swept away by it. I want to go down dive in, as is my ritual, but too high, too cold, some other time, some other adventure.  A lot of history way before humans: the rivers didn’t carve themselves down into the rock, the rock rose into them, ‘like a cake rising into the knife.’ Merican Empire just a pebble to these dragons. Wish I could hear them—lay on a rock, take a long deep three-hour nap in the sun, but I have many miles to go before I sleep: my shadow longer than my self.

Going through a quart of water nibbling raisins and nuts. Last one out which is contenting. Tired tired tired—more than five miles. Sun coming in horizontal on redrock hills, glowing yellow west aspects, end o’ day downslope winds picking up. Didn’t even sit down at the overlook, gonna be sore tomorrow on the drive back, but powered by thoughts of thai food for dinner—maybe that ginger sauce stir fry and iced tea. Almost do take a wrong turn down a canyon—no footprints of fellow travelers and vanishers. Backtrack look around for the cairns—up—hiking here is three dimensional, maybe four dimensional somehow. Though mostly the way back is downhill. Pass back thru The Portal into the real world (or is it the other way around) finally weirdly back at the trailhead. Change out of my sweatsoaked clothes—moment of cold nakedness celebration—sun down faint light in western sky. Drive out alone, the only moving thing, though a couple fires in Elephant Butte Campground. Back into town and directly to food. Can barely move—thai iced tea to keep awake. Back to motel hot bath. A sense of what? Contentment? Pride? Peace? Solitude recharged. This is the trip: you can leave. Just go be alone.

John Yohe

Born in Puerto Rico, John Yohe has worked as a wildland firefighter, wilderness ranger and fire lookout. Best of the Net nominee x2. Notable Essay List for The Best American Essays 2021 and 2022. Twitter: @thejohnyohe.